NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be
released, as is being done in connection with this case, at the
time the opinion is issued.The syllabus constitutes no part
of the opinion of the Court but has been prepared by the
Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader.See
United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co.,200 U.S. 321,
337.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED
STATES

GONZALES, ATTORNEY GENERAL, et al. v.
RAICH et al.

CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

No. 031454.Argued November 29,
2004Decided June 6, 2005

Californias Compassionate Use Act
authorizes limited marijuana use for medicinal purposes.
Respondents Raich and Monson are California residents who both
use doctor-recommended marijuana for serious medical
conditions. After federal Drug Enforcement Administration
(DEA) agents seized and destroyed all six of Monsons
cannabis plants, respondents brought this action seeking
injunctive and declaratory relief prohibiting the enforcement
of the federal Controlled Substances Act (CSA) to the extent it
prevents them from possessing, obtaining, or manufacturing
cannabis for their personal medical use. Respondents claim
that enforcing the CSA against them would violate the Commerce
Clause and other constitutional provisions. The District Court
denied respondents motion for a preliminary injunction,
but the Ninth Circuit reversed, finding that they had
demonstrated a strong likelihood of success on the claim that
the CSA is an unconstitutional exercise of Congress
Commerce Clause authority as applied to the intrastate,
noncommercial cultivation and possession of cannabis for
personal medical purposes as recommended by a patients
physician pursuant to valid California state law. The court
relied heavily on United States v. Lopez,514 U.S. 549, and
United States v. Morrison, 529 U.S. 598, to hold
that this separate class of purely local activities was beyond
the reach of federal power.

Held: Congress Commerce
Clause authority includes the power to prohibit the local
cultivation and use of marijuana in compliance with California
law. Pp. 631.

(a) For the
purposes of consolidating various drug laws into a
comprehensive statute, providing meaningful regulation over
legitimate sources of drugs to prevent diversion into illegal
channels, and strengthening law enforcement tools against
international and interstate drug trafficking, Congress enacted
the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of
1970, Title II of which is the CSA. To effectuate the
statutory goals, Congress devised a closed regulatory system
making it unlawful to manufacture, distribute, dispense, or
possess any controlled substance except as authorized by the
CSA. 21 U.S.C. §
841(a)(1), 844(a). All controlled substances are
classified into five schedules, §812, based on their
accepted medical uses, their potential for abuse, and their
psychological and physical effects on the body,
§§811, 812.Marijuana is classified as a
Schedule I substance, §812(c), based on its high
potential for abuse, no accepted medical use, and no accepted
safety for use in medically supervised treatment,
§812(b)(1). This classification renders the manufacture,
distribution, or possession of marijuana a criminal offense.
§§841(a)(1), 844(a). Pp. 611.

(b) Congress power to
regulate purely local activities that are part of an economic
class of activities that have a substantial effect
on interstate commerce is firmly established. See, e.g.,
Perez v. United States,402 U.S. 146, 151.
If Congress decides that the  total
incidence  of a practice poses a threat to a
national market, it may regulate the entire class. See,
e.g., id., at 154155. Of particular relevance
here is Wickard v. Filburn, 317 U.S. 111,
127128, where, in rejecting the appellee farmers
contention that Congress admitted power to regulate the
production of wheat for commerce did not authorize federal
regulation of wheat production intended wholly for the
appellees own consumption, the Court established that
Congress can regulate purely intrastate activity that is not
itself commercial, i.e., not produced for
sale, if it concludes that failure to regulate that class of
activity would undercut the regulation of the interstate market
in that commodity. The similarities between this case and
Wickard are striking. In both cases, the regulation is
squarely within Congress commerce power because
production of the commodity meant for home consumption, be it
wheat or marijuana, has a substantial effect on supply and
demand in the national market for that commodity. In assessing
the scope of Congress Commerce Clause authority, the
Court need not determine whether respondents activities,
taken in the aggregate, substantially affect interstate
commerce in fact, but only whether a rational basis
exists for so concluding. E.g., Lopez, 514 U.S., at
557. Given the enforcement difficulties that attend
distinguishing between marijuana cultivated locally and
marijuana grown elsewhere, 21 U.S.C. §
801(5), and concerns about diversion into illicit channels,
the Court has no difficulty concluding that Congress had a
rational basis for believing that failure to regulate the
intrastate manufacture and possession of marijuana would leave
a gaping hole in the CSA. Pp. 1220.

(c) Respondents heavy
reliance on Lopez and Morrison overlooks the
larger context of modern-era Commerce Clause jurisprudence
preserved by those cases, while also reading those cases far
too broadly. The statutory challenges at issue there were
markedly different from the challenge here. Respondents ask
the Court to excise individual applications of a concededly
valid comprehensive statutory scheme. In contrast, in both
Lopez and Morrison, the parties asserted that a
particular statute or provision fell outside Congress
commerce power in its entirety. This distinction is pivotal
for the Court has often reiterated that [w]here the class
of activities is regulated and that class is within the reach
of federal power, the courts have no power to excise, as
trivial, individual instances of the class.
Perez, 402 U.S., at 154. Moreover, the Court emphasized
that the laws at issue in Lopez and Morrison had
nothing to do with commerce or any sort of economic
enterprise. See Lopez, 514 U.S., at 561; Morrison,
529 U.S., at 610. In contrast, the CSA regulates
quintessentially economic activities: the production,
distribution, and consumption of commodities for which there is
an established, and lucrative, interstate market. Prohibiting
the intrastate possession or manufacture of an article of
commerce is a rational means of regulating commerce in that
product. The Ninth Circuit cast doubt on the CSAs
constitutionality by isolating a distinct class of activities
that it held to be beyond the reach of federal power: the
intrastate, noncommercial cultivation, possession, and use of
marijuana for personal medical purposes on the advice of a
physician and in accordance with state law. However, Congress
clearly acted rationally in determining that this subdivided
class of activities is an essential part of the larger
regulatory scheme. The case comes down to the claim that a
locally cultivated product that is used domestically rather
than sold on the open market is not subject to federal
regulation. Given the CSAs findings and the undisputed
magnitude of the commercial market for marijuana,
Wickard and its progeny foreclose that claim. Pp.
2030.

352 F.3d 1222, vacated and remanded.

Stevens, J.,
delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Kennedy, Souter,
Ginsburg, and Breyer, JJ., joined. Scalia, J., filed an
opinion concurring in the judgment. OConnor, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which
Rehnquist, C. J., and Thomas, J.,
joined as to all but Part III. Thomas, J., filed a dissenting
opinion.